Conflict, Power, and Multitude in Machiavelli and Spinoza: Tumult and Indignation

<em>Conflict, Power and Multitude in Machiavelli and Spinoza</em> explores Spinoza’s political philosophy by confronting it with that of Niccolò Machiavelli. <br>Filippo Del Lucchese conducts a study of the relationship between Machiavelli and Spinoza from a perspective at once philosophical, historical and political. <br>The book begins by showing how closely tied the two thinkers are in relation to realism. Del Lucchese then goes on to examine the theme of conflict as a crucial element of an understanding of Machiavelli and Spinoza’s conceptions of modernity. <br><br>The book concludes with an examination of the concept of ‘multiplicity’ and ‘plural’ expressions of politics, namely Machiavelli’s popolo and Spinoza’s multitudo. Overall, the Machiavelli-Spinoza axis offers a fruitful perspective through which to analyse the relationship between contending ideas of modernity from a historical point of view, and provides an original point of departure for discussing some key theoretical, political and juridical notions that have resurfaced in contemporary debates.